Eagle Forum of Sacramento

In the next few weeks Californians will be inundated with media messages about the
importance of allowing same-sex marriages. Voters will see TV ads telling them that
homosexual love deserves “equality” with heterosexual love. Voters will hear radio
reports about how all gays and lesbians want is to have the same “rights” as all
married couples. And the main message that will be repeated is that allowing homosexuals
to marry will have no impact on your marriage or your family-so what’s the harm
in giving gays their chance to marry?
Although on the surface these arguments appear convincing, they don’t tell the whole
truth.
Homosexual marriage will have a direct, intrusive and damaging effect on your family.
Public Schools will teach that homosexuality and same-sex marriage are normal and
acceptable-and if you disagree, you are a bigot. Books like “Heather has Two Mommies”
or “Daddy’s Wedding” will be used to teach kindergartners about homosexual relationships.
When parents in Boston complained about an eighth-grade teacher instructing students
about gay sex, the teacher responded, “Give me a break. It’s legal now.”

Churches will be required to perform homosexual marriage ceremonies or face prosecution
under anti-discrimination laws. The California Supreme Court recently ruled that
medical professionals may not defer treatment to another professional based on
their religious objections. In other words, Christians and those with moral beliefs
must check their conscience at the door when they arrive at work. The same case
law will apply to churches. Pastors will no longer be allowed to refuse marrying
homosexuals based on their religious beliefs.

Businesses will be prosecuted for not participating in homosexual ceremonies. A
New Mexico photography company is being prosecuted for refusing to photograph the
“commitment ceremony” of a homosexual couple. The full force of the government will
used to make citizens publicly accept homosexuality.

Married couples will no longer be considered “bride and groom,” but “Party A and
Party B.” A young couple in Placer County wrote the terms “bride” and “groom” on
their marriage license, which was returned from the state as an “unacceptable alteration.”
A husband and wife are legally referred to now as Party A and Party B according
to the California government. By redefining marriage, every marriage has already
been affected.
The role of parents will be diminished. The family unit is already under assault
with no-fault divorce, acceptance of single parenthood, and nanny government usurping
the role of fathers. Homosexual marriage worsens this trend by giving government
approval to single-sex parenting. Children need both a mother and a father. By
approving homosexual marriage, government and society denies children their right
and need for both parents.
These are just a few of the negative, damaging consequences of allowing homosexual
marriage in our society. When you encounter a neighbor, church member, work associate,
or family member who says, “I’m not a bigot-and homosexual marriage won’t affect
me,” remind them of just how much it will impact their family and all families.
This is not an issue of bigotry, but of ensuring marriage isn’t redefined by four
activist judges. Wanting children to be raised by both of their parents isn’t bigoted
either. What’s truly bigoted is telling Christians, Jews, Muslims and other people
of faith that their beliefs must be silenced.

The California State Supreme Court, lead by Chief Justice Ron George, repealed California law stating that marriage is between a man and a woman as set forth by both the Legislature and the people through the passage of Prop. 22.< ?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

The Court’s ruling is breathtaking for its overreach. Using words like “dignity” (23 times), “liberty” (34 times), and “privacy” (37 times) to describe same-sex partners full right to marry, the Court overturned millennia of experience and more than 150 years of state law precedence. (For the ruling, see: http://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/opinions/documents/S147999.PDF.) In so doing, their strained justifications threw the door wide open to polygamous and incestuous marriage. How? By using the flawed logic that marriage is none of the government’s business insofar as marriage should be afforded to all to afford people privacy, liberty and dignity. The same weak logic can be applied to the “plural” marriages of the Fundamentalist LDS cult in Texas or to a devout Muslim citizen of Saudi Arabia who wishes to emigrate to California with his four wives. In fact, due to the equal protection provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment, both a Fundamentalist LDS cult member and a devout Muslim could argue that their First Amendment right to free exercise of religion are being violated by any restriction on polygamy “after all, their ‘dignity,’ ‘liberty,’ and ‘privacy’” would be violated otherwise.

Allow me to close my comments with two political observations.

First, the Court’s sweeping ruling is likely to ignite support for the California Marriage Protection Act, a constitutional ballot initiative that would overrule the Court’s decision that should appear on the ballot this November. (See: http://www.protectmarriage.com/.) This, in turn, may have an impact on other California races, from the President on down to the legislative races. In this, liberal Democrats should be wary of what they wish for!

Second, I find it ironic to see commentators describe the Court as conservative since the majority of its members were appointed by Republican governors. Lest we forget, there is a simmering divide in the Republican Party over whether the label “conservative” includes social policy, or only tax and fiscal policy. Chief Judge Ron George was first appointed by Gov. Deukmejian, then appointed chief justice by Gov. Wilson. Justice Ron George has had a long history of very liberal rulings long before the same sex marriage ruling. In fact, back in 1997, I drafted a resolution opposing Justice Ron George for his election in 1998. It passed the Orange County Republican Party Central Committee, then stalled when it hit the California Republican Party. It was argued that Justice George was a Republican, so the Party should support him. The reason for my opposition to Judge George in 1997 was his ruling in American Academy of Pediatrics v. Lungren which overturned a California law requiring parental consent for minors to obtain abortions (“privacy” of the minor girl was the reason cited in that case too). Other bad rulings already made by Justice George at that time included: a pro-criminal decision in People v. Superior Court (Romero), three anti-private property rights decisions in Ehrlich v. Culver City, Smith v. Fair Employment and Housing Commission, and Alcarez v. Vece, a pro-public union decision in Loder v. City of Glendale, and an anti-business decision in Stevenson v. Superior Court.

Of course, there is the remote possibility that Judge George’s terrible ruling really is a Republican plot in the vast right wing conspiracy to boost conservative turnout so much that McCain wins California and is elected President in 2008, stranger things have happened in the world of politics.

Just for old time’s sake, I’ve reprinted below the 1997 resolution that passed the OC Republican Party Central Committee only to fail at the California Republican Party convention. It was authored by me and my long time friend, Fred Whitaker, a respected Orange attorney who should someday be on the California Supreme Court.

*************************************
A Resolution Calling to Oppose Confirmation of Certain California Supreme Court Judges.

WHEREAS, The California Supreme Court overturned a 1987 law requiring parental consent for minors to obtain abortions.

WHEREAS, The law in question was a carefully written to meet the U.S. Supreme Court’s strict guidelines for valid parental consent legislation.

WHEREAS, Chief Justice George, Justice Chin, Justice Kennard, and Justice Werdegar ruled that the parental consent law violated the “autonomy privacy rights” of minor girls. Further that a minor girl’s uninhibited right to an abortion “is so central to the preservation of her ability to define and adhere to her ultimate values regarding the meaning of human existence and life, “we conclude that a minor who is pregnant has a protected privacy interest under the California Constitution in making the decision whether to continue or to terminate her own pregnancy.” Yet, almost a year earlier, the court ruled that the same law was valid.

WHEREAS, Lower courts in California blocked enforcement soon after its passage in 1987, claiming that girls as young as 13 or 14 possess the necessary maturity and rationality to make informed decisions about abortion. Yet, under the law do not have maturity and rationality for ear piercing and medical treatment without parental consent until age 18.

WHEREAS, These arguments, aside from ignoring common sense and human experience, are irrelevant to the issue of constitutionality which is supposed to be the only reason for the court to overturn legislation.

WHEREAS, A parent’s right to direct his or her child’s upbringing is among the most basic of human rights.

WHEREAS, Justice Mosk, in dissent, pointed out that according to the ruling, the privacy rights for minor girls would reach to those who were as young as nine years old.

WHEREAS, Justice Brown, noted in her dissent that the California Constitution protects “a parent’s interest in directing his child’s upbringing” and that the “liberty interest of a minor is qualitatively different than that of an adult, being subject both to reasonable regulation by the state and to an extent not permissible with adults.”

WHEREAS, It is illogical and inconsistent to require that minors obtain parental permission for aspirin at school, tattoos, tanning salons, body piercing, drivers’ licenses, etc., but not for a dangerous and invasive procedure like an abortion.

WHEREAS, This Court’s judicial activism is reminiscent of the Rose Bird Court when, the rule of law in California succumbed to the whim of four justices occupying seats on its highest court.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the California Republican Party joins the Republican Party of Orange County in calling upon itself and all those of good will to actively oppose confirmation for any California State Supreme Court Justice who voted to overturn the 1987 law requiring parental consent for minor girls to obtain abortions.

Cosponsors:
Fred M. Whitaker, Member
Chuck DeVore, Member

Chuck DeVore
California State Assemblyman, 70th District
www.ChuckDeVore.com

Eagle Forum of Sacramento
Georgiana Preskar-Director

The voice was loud and filled with anger. No matter what Michael Medved said to him, the caller had his ideas about the Boy Scouts of America. The group was hateful and must be eliminated. The caller was homosexual.

There was no tolerance in this man’s voice nor in the many that followed. Even though the boy scouts in Pennsylvania had done remarkable things for the youth, these callers said it would be better for the entire organization to be dissolved than for them to continue doing good deeds. The suggestion to start their own Rainbow Scouts was unacceptable. Their desire is for the traditional organization to acknowledge that homosexuality is normal and even in line with “natural” law.

Each voice sent chills down my body. Hatred radiated through the radio and I knew that these callers had an agenda and nothing would stop them. Corporations, schools, government and churches have compromised to meet the needs and wants of homosexuals. Now there stands two groups who will not compromise; the Salvation Army and the Boy Scouts of America.

How supportive will we be for their cause? Most people will just say in their usual apathetic voice, “Isn’t that a shame. They were such a wonderful group for children.” Then they will move on with their busy lives.

The voices filled with anger will continue. The owners of these voices will not hush until their lifestyle is accepted as natural and normal. Homosexual activists will trample everything in their way. Some churches still stand in dignity and the family unit is still somewhat strong on marriage between one man and one woman. But civil unions, partnerships, and same-sex benefits are commonly accepted.

Our last stand is the Salvation Army and the Boy Scouts of America. As they stand their ground, the homosexual voices grow louder letting America know that they will not be silenced. They have no tolerance and the ugliness of the act to destroy this group of Scouts in Pennsylvania is truly the voice of hate.

I asked myself, as I read the attached article, how I missed this news in December. Was it ever a big news story? People I talked with today, had not heard of it either. But once again, diversity addiction has never been recognized for what it is, or for its incredible power to orchestrate change.

The homosexuals have won. We cannot erase this new form of love that allows the closing of the boy scouts’ building, over natural law and God’s way? We can, however, take action, and save any voice of liberty that we may have left!

Special Note: Please forward this e-mail to all of your California friends and associates.
This will help us get out the news about the SB 777 referendum petitions!

Overview of SB 777

As average citizens become aware of the SB 777 referendum, they have several questions
that we would like to answer in order to further educate and inform. Authored by
lesbian state senator Sheila Kuehl, and signed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger,
Senate Bill 777 prohibits any classroom instruction or school-sponsored activities
that “promote a discriminatory bias” against homosexuals, transsexuals, bisexuals,
transgenders and other controversial lifestyles. This means equal time instruction
about these lifestyles for children as young as 5. It would “promote bias” against
homosexuals to only discuss heterosexual families. Students with religious or traditional
values will be victims of reverse discrimination if they voice their opinions at
school. This is one of the most outrageous assaults on traditional families values
that we have witnessed in California. The SB 777 referendum will “refer” the bill
to California voters and ask them to overturn this shocking new law.

Major Milestone Reached!

Save Our Kids is thrilled to announce that we have already counted 100,000 signatures!
Our volunteers are working around the clock to continue counting the petitions we
receive in the mail every day. We know that we have enough petitions circulating
to qualify the referendum, but we need them returned ASAP so that we can continue
counting and preparing the petitions for submission to the Secretary of State.

To date, we have mailed more than 400,000 petitions! With space for 10 signatures
each, that equals 4 million signatures!

We have done all that we can do on our end-now it is up to the People to gather
signatures and mail them back.

Please begin mailing your petitions right away! Each and every signature will be
vital to getting the 500,000 signatures we need.

Deadline Confusion

There has been some confusion about the actual deadlines for returning petitions.
Here are the official dates:

December 21st: Last day to request petitions from www.SaveOurKids.net [http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?e=001A1f2UKqHc_PFpv3SPw-DsyBXBugpGMRFrSNLwgxds1IhaWawqHZZCEBAmQdeLTxytU5FcwBnfz0YYP8EYojjvclxuRV9nJtR6hd4HFMf_57pCnWwbKd1_A==]
*
January 4th: Last day for campaign to receive petitions (they must be mailed a few
days prior to ensure their arrival by the 4th!)

Please keep working on gathering signatures until we reach our January 4th deadline!
We need every single signature we can get to qualify this referendum.

Save Our Kids Weekend!

December 28th-30th

With only a few weeks left in the campaign, Save Our Kids is encouraging families,
Bible study groups, political organizations and churches to make one last push for
signatures. December 28th-30th is Save Our Kids weekend!

During the Christmas and New Year season, many of our fellow citizens will be out
at shopping centers and stores. This is the perfect time to set up a table to gather
signatures. In just a few hours, you can make a huge difference by informing your
fellow citizens and gathering signatures.

Churches should host a petition drive this weekend to inform their members about
this assault on traditional values. Save Our Kids has several resources to assist
churches in hosting a petition drive. So far, churches have been an integral part
of this effort. These beacons of light can push us across the finish line if they
continue to host petition drives.

We need your help to make this campaign a success!

We are continually amazed by the dedication of our pro-family allies. Average citizens
are answering the call to protect and defend the innocence of our children. Thank
you for partnering with us in this historic effort to preserve our values!

Order Petitions

Just the Facts – The Truth About SB 777 [http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?e=001A1f2UKqHc_MbrVKNRF4FiUEV0aeAuPowr7BpY_lAt5kBjNkl4oXxUNjq-mApbUQ8pBXJDxr7hfwEcYaN02G_LoBTEyzZX3KJVVN1uFi_ZBRTZEnPQL3noxCy1LIcMb_AVcsFg2kDjhZiTmZG9ocGAA==]

Contribute to the Save our Kids Campaign [http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?e=001A1f2UKqHc_O40cyogX6lK2vWc8rdWREZWRujdoOJ9kme8dv8F2_Z60tU51eNnGTf----8fqBnYBrgqx1r77oh3HqB9HoiaFJf3Yi_JqW30dUWAwX2e3tH_2UgsJCKMxlbuAlOA4n269bznjJbNplslHQ6jyG0R6AhI1QqV7gYQUDMUbDdoRcEg==]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Save Our Kids Co-Chairs
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Senator George Runner
Assemblyman Joel Anderson
Assemblyman Bob Huff
Assemblyman Doug La Malfa
Assemblywoman Sharon Runner
Assemblywoman Audra Strickland
Senate Candidate Dennis Mountjoy
Assembly Candidate Larry Dick
Assembly Candidate Jim Nielson

By Robert Knight | November 15, 2007 – 11:42 ET
When California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed two bills on Oct. 12 that essentially turn the state’s public schools over to homosexual and transgender activists, there was virtually no media coverage outside California. There still isn’t.

Beginning in January 2008, California public schools must teach children as young as 3 to 5 years old that homosexuality is a normal, healthy lifestyle and that kids can choose their “gender.” This means banning the terms “husband” and “wife” for the more progressively inclusive term “partner.” “Moms” and “dads” will morph into sexually neutral “parents.” Textbooks will be rewritten to blot out any reminder of married-couple-led families as a social norm. Gender-confused kids will get to use the restrooms of their choice. Any expression of negativity toward deviant sexuality will be punished as “bigotry.” The coming changes are so radical that they produce gasps or professions of disbelief from people who hear about it from sources outside the mainstream media.

Bruce Shortt, an advocate of private schooling who writes a periodic report called “the Continuing Collapse” about problems in government schools, provides this analysis:

So far, the media have maintained a near total news blackout on this development.

A recent article [at Medill Reports online] on homosexual gains in the schools reflects how the advocates of legislation to mainstream deviant lifestyles plan to respond to queries from naive or fellow travelling reporters:

With the October signing of Senate Bill 777, California is the most recent state to have seen a battle between the two sides. Its sponsor, state Rep. Sheila Kuehl of Los Angeles, said the bill did little more than make language in the education code consistent with language in the state’s other anti-discrimination laws. Discrimination based on sexual identity, she said, had been illegal in California for eight years.

So, the official story line is that SB 777 just makes technical changes that bring the Education Code into conformity with other laws that have been on the books for a long time. In other words, “nothing to see here folks, just move along.”

Of course, Kuehl is right in a sense. After all, we could pass legislation requiring Jack Daniel’s to be served in school cafeterias, and then claim that we are just making the Education Code consistent with other laws that have been on the books for years (the Volkstead Amendment was repealed over 70 years ago, and drinking alcohol is legal in California).

Leaving aside the question of any prior California legislation regarding deviant lifestyles and ADULTS, the relevant question is whether Zelda’s “advanced thoughts” on this subject should be inflicted on children. The reporter, as you will note, didn’t really get to this, and she entirely missed the importance of California’s brave new definition of “gender.”

Transcription of Phyllis Schlafly’s Testimony

Before Arkansas State Agency & Governmental Affairs House Committee 

on ERA Bill, (HJR1002)February 7, 2007

(In less than ten minutes)

Schlafly Bio:  Phyllis Schlafly was recently named one of the one hundred most important women of the twentieth century by the Ladies’ Home Journal.  She is a Constitutional lawyer and  president of  Eagle Forum which has chapters in every state.  Her syndicated column appears in one hundred newspapers, her radio commentaries are heard daily on 460 stations, and her radio talk show, "Phyllis Schlafly Live" is heard weekly on forty stations. Schlafly is the author of twenty books and has testified before more than fifty Congresisonal and State Legislative committees.  The mother of six children, Mrs.Schlafly was the 1992 Illinois Mother of the Year. Friends and foes of  Schlafly give her credit for galvanizing the grassroots movement that defeated ERA in its ten-year battle from 1972to 1982 when Presidents of both parties and the media had all endorsed it.    [And all these feats were accomplished without an Equal Rights Amendment]

Transcription of Testimony:

Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee:  Thank you for allowing us to hear a non constituent.  I have a special place in my heart for Arkansas because my husband’s family owned the Mountain Valley Spring in Hot Springs from 1900 to 1987; and my husband brought me there on our honeymoon.  I still drink Moutain Valley water, now owned by Arkansas people, and it is the finest water in the world.  So thank you.

Now you have heard about an hour and half of advocacy for the Equal Rights Amendment; but I note that you didn’t hear about one single law, federal or state, that discriminates against women that this amendment will remedy.  I note that you didn’t hear a single benefit that women will get out of the Equal Rights Amendment.  This thing was debated for 10 years, from 1972 to 1982;  and it was rejected by fifteen states outright and five more that rescinded and changed their mind.

I think the main reason it was rescinded and rejected was that it is a fraud.  It pretends to help women, but it does nothing for women; and they are not able to show any benefit, any correction of law that the Equal Rights Amendment will do.  You know that the amendment does not put  women in the Constitution, and it does not put gender in the constitution.  It puts sex in the Constitution.  Now we are at the mercy of the judges. The Equal Rights Amendment does not say whether it is the sex you are or the sex you do.  We leave all those decisions up to the judges.

Now in looking for what the Equal Rights Amendment will do, I look to the best top authority on that subject.  And the leading lawyer in favor of the  Equal Rights Amendment  those years was Ruth Bader Ginsburg who is now on the United States  Supreme Court.  She wrote a book, a 230 page book, to tell exactly how the Equal Rights Amendment will affect federal law; and she is very explicit in it.  I think there probably  is no higher authority about what it will actually do. 

What it will do is make all our laws sex neutral.  Now we have the matter of the draft.  Now nobody denies that  if you have strict scrutiny you are going to have women not only subject to the draft, when and if there is a draft, but also subject to combat.  We know women are exempted from infantry combat and  submarines today.  Those differences are there.  Now a very powerful Democrat today, Congressman Charlie Rangel has got his bill to reinstate the draft; and, of course, it is sex neutral.  I am going to do everything I can to prevent his bill from passing.  But if it passed, there is no question about the effect of ERA.  It would treat women exactly the same as men, and women do not want to be treated the same as men in the military and in combat.

Now among other things that Ruth Bader Ginsburg says in this, and what she doesn’t say, is that it is going to have no effect on the Constitution itself because the Constitution  is already sex neutral.  The Constitution  does not say men are created equal.  That is in the Declaration of Independence. Fortunately you are not amending the Declaration of Independence.  We are talking about the Constitution. And the Constitution uses exclusively sex neutral terms, we the people, citizens, residents, inhabitants, president, ambassador, representative. Women have every Constitutional right that men have.

Also this book makes clear that it has nothing to do with employment.  It is not going to give women a raise or make them equal in the board rooms or in the legislatures because our employment laws are already sex neutral; and this book makes that clear.

However, there are some differences.  One of the differences is the effect it would  have on homemakers in this country.  One of the most offensive things that Ruth Bader Ginsburg says in this book is that the concept of  dependent wife must be eliminated from the code.  What does that mean?  The social security system rests on the concept of  the dependent wife.  I get my social security based on my husband’s income over the years, and I am sure that is true of many women here today.  Social security is a very pro-women institution because it gives the benefit to the dependent wife, the dependent wife  who is not, herself, in the workforce.  According to Ruth Bader Ginsburg, that is a concept that must be eliminated from the code under ERA.  This book was written to describe how ERA will affect federal laws.

And then she [Ruth Bader Ginsburg] goes into how it will change the words when  you say you can’t discriminate on account of sex.  She gives a whole list of words that will have to be changed.  And among the words that would have to be deleted from the federal code are husband and wife.  Now that is a direct attack on the Defense of Marriage Act, DOMA, which says that marriage is the union of a man and a woman as husband and wife.  Feminists don’t like that.  They want to put us into a sex neutral world, and it certainly  would have a direct effect on the Federal DOMA.

She [Ruth Bader Ginsburg]  makes very clear that the ERA would require treating sex like we treat race.  That is one of their arguments.  And it would require everything that is separated according to sex to be sex integrated.  Now,  she specifically says that this would include the Scouts.  It is discriminatory to have Girl Scouts and Boy  Scouts. They would have to be put together.   She says  fraternities and sororities would have to be combined.  She says even prisons would have to be sex integrated.

There are all kinds of mischief she [Ruth Bader Ginsburg] has in this book under her name, in a book published and paid for by the US government.  She makes arguments that I never dared to make, that it will wipe out the laws against prostitution and the laws against bigamy – that it would reduce the age of consent to 12;  She even goes after Mother’s Day because that would be sex discriminatory.

Of course, in the matter of marriage, it would open up the courts to all kinds of litigation by the gay rights movement which is working very hard on every type of  judge they can find to give them whatever they want to have.  Again, the Equal Rights Amendment  says you can’t discriminate on account of sex, and that is what you are talking about.  If you deny a marriage license to a man and a man, you have discriminated on account of sex. All of the highest legal authorities from Harvard and Yale have all said that the equal rights amendment would okay same sex marriage.

I was on the platform with the great Senator Sam Irvin, considered then the leading legal authority in the Senate, the great Watergate Senator, who said the only people who would profit by the Equal Rights Amendment would be the homosexuals; and you could have all kinds of litigation on that.

On the matter of abortion, we know that the New Mexico case is very clear.  The argument of the feminists is abortion is something that happens only to women;  therefore, if you deny any rights or any funding on abortion, you  have discriminated on account of sex within the meaning of the Equal Rights Amendment.   Now we do not have nineteen states with state ERA’s.  There are only six of the states that have ERA’s in the same language as the proposed federal ERA. One of those is New Mexico, and that is why New Mexico said that it is discrimination to deny funding for abortion in New Mexico. 

Another one of those states is Hawaii, which is where they okayed same sex marriage based on the state’s ERA.  Hawaii had to pass another Constitutional amendment saying in effect, "No, we didn’t mean that." 

So there are all kinds of problems that come along, and I think it would move the whole area of family law to the federal government because of Section II.  Section II says the Congress will have the power to enforce it by appropriate legislation and there are all kinds of family property laws, divorce, child custody, that would then become federal matters under the ERA.

This country wisely rejected it after long debate, and I think what it comes down to is how the judges interpret it.  And we have no confidence –  you asked for assurance of what the judges are going to do –  we don’t know what they are going to do.

But in any event, I think the country made a very good decision in voting it down in a ten-year battle that went on all across the country; and I hope that we a leave it decently buried.

Thank you Mr. Chairman, for listening.

Chairman – Thank you very much and without pausing said,   Seeing there are no questions (then goes to next witness)

The committee defeated the ERA bill by one vote, 10 to 10.  They needed 11 votes to get it out of committee.

This article can be read online at this link:  http://www.wpaag.org/ERA%20-%20Schlafly%20Testimony%20in%20AR%202-7-07.htm

Gay demands shift from equality to special endorsement

By Michael Medved
Wednesday, December 6, 2006

In current debates over gay relationships and their position in society, we’ve moved beyond a plea for acceptance and equality to an increasingly strident claim of homosexual superiority and a demand for special status and endorsement.

In a recent syndicated column about Pastor Ted Haggard, the former head of the National Association of Evangelicals who confessed to a three year affair with a gay, drug-dealing prostitute, Ellen Goodman wrote of "people who heard a man wounded by the culture of demonization. Their sympathy was for a man primed for repression and deception by the teaching of homosexuality as a sin… More gays, more friends, families, co-workers have come to believe that gayness is not a choice, let alone a sin."

In other words, some tender-hearted Americans feel ready to forgive, even to embrace, a religious leader who routinely paid a sex-for-hire hustler to cheat in a Denver hotel room on his wife and five kids while getting high on illegal and dangerous methamphetamines. Try to imagine that Haggard had engaged in his extra-marital adventures with a female hooker, rather than a middle-aged call boy. Would anyone have come forward to express "sympathy" for the man or to view him as a sad victim of "repression"?

By the same token, former New Jersey  Democrat governor James McGreevy recently wrote a best-selling book called "Confession," describing his risky and degrading encounters in men’s rooms and back alleys. He even spoke of inviting his male lover (placed on the state payroll despite a total absence of qualifications) into his marital bed in the governor’s mansion while his wife struggled in the hospital with a troubled pregnancy. Oprah Winfrey (and others) now hail McGreevy for his "courage" in speaking so openly and proudly of his newly-discovered status as a "gay American." Would any public figure receive similarly indulgent treatment after confessing serial infidelity with a member of the opposite sex?

Finally, the Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire, Gene Robinson, made headlines as the first openly gay clergyman to reach such a leadership position in his denomination. The media paid little attention, however, to the fact that Bishop Robinson (who is currently undergoing rehab treatment for alcoholism) had initially embraced his gay identity when he left his wife and three children for a relationship with another man. Would the Episcopal Church or any other significant religious body so readily grant a position of spiritual leadership to a priest who had abandoned his family for an extra-marital affair with a partner of the opposite sex?

In high profile cases, in other words, we seem far more willing to forgive and forget faithless behavior if that infidelity involves a homosexual connection. This amounts to the granting of a special dispensation, a privileged position, to same-sex attraction-giving more latitude to gay relationships than we’d ever grant to straight romances. The justification for this attitude involves the notion that gay men who leave or destroy their families for the sake of homosexual affairs are simply discovering, at long last, their true identities after years of repression- coming to terms with "who they really are."

But what about those aging heterosexuals who may also suddenly discover– at age sixty, say-that they’ve been repressing their true identities? Couldn’t they also argue that it seemed suddenly inauthentic to remain trapped with a sagging partner of similar age, when a powerful, undeniable inner voice and the evolutionary imperative demanded they connect with nubile twenty-somethings eager for experienced and wealthy companionship?

In fact, every study of human sexuality would suggest that far more men feel tempted to heed their deep-seated, undeniable authentic desires to cheat with other (particularly younger) women than feel drawn into relationships with other men. Does this greater incidence of heterosexual temptation make it more – or less– "natural" and worthy of respect than homosexual impulses? The tendency to forgive, or even endorse, same-sex attractions while condemning the vastly more common opposite gender desires, amounts to the granting of a preferential position to homosexuality.

Gays Who Want To Censor Free Speech

Nov. 8, 2006 by Phyllis Schlafly

Same-sex marriage is not the only goal of the gay rights movement. It’s becoming clear that another goal is the suppression of Americans’ First Amendment right to criticize the gay agenda.
The gay lobby tried a broadside attempt to censor criticism by passing a national "hate crimes" law. Fortunately, Congress didn’t pass that law, but gay activists are obviously trying to achieve much the same effect through political pressure and intimidation.

Scott Bloch, the head of the U.S. Office of Special Counsel (OSC) in the Bush Administration, has been targeted for termination because he removed "sexual orientation" from the list of anti-discrimination laws protecting employment at federal agencies. Bloch discovered that his Clinton-appointed predecessor, Elaine Kaplan, had unilaterally inserted "sexual orientation" in the list without any statutory authorization, so he removed it.

The gay lobby retaliated, instigating five investigations against Bloch. After all five cleared him of any wrongdoing, the response by the gay lobby was to initiate a sixth investigation.

Reportedly, Bloch has privately been told to resign, twice suggesting that he might be fired if he doesn’t. Letters from supporters caused the White House to back off before the election, but it is apparent that the Bush Administration has no stomach for this fight and hopes Bloch will go quietly.

There have actually been very few complaints against the Bush Administration about job discrimination against homosexuals. Bush just appointed open homosexual Mark Dybul as U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator, and when he was sworn in with the rank of ambassador, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice praised his "wonderful family" and referred to his partner’s mother as Dybul’s "mother-in-law."

Luis Padilla, an employee of a large corporation in Virginia, put this message on the rear window of his pickup truck: "Please, vote for marriage on Nov. 7." His bosses ordered him to remove it because some people said it offended them.

Padilla then parked his truck on what he thought (apparently incorrectly) was outside of company property, but he was fired anyway. After a couple of state legislators took up his cause, the company reinstated him.

Robert J. Smith, who served (at a small salary) as Maryland’s representative on the Washington Metro transit board, mentioned his religious views against homosexual conduct during an appearance on a cable television program. Although probably few saw the show, gay activists demanded that he be fired, and Republican Governor Robert Ehrlich complied.

Michael Campion, a psychologist with the Minneapolis Police Department, was suspended because of his past affiliation with a group critical of the gay lifestyle, despite reports of a good job performance. The city of Springfield, Illinois, had previously terminated his services for the same reason.

If Americans don’t resist such assaults on free speech, we may be headed down the Canadian road. Dozens of Vancouver postal workers just refused to deliver mail they called "homophobic."

In Yale University’s student newspaper, a columnist recently described that institution as "really, really gay. Like, totally gay." Yet, when one email expressed a dissenting view on Yale’s gay pride day, gay activists demanded reprisals against the dissenter.

Middlebury College now invites applicants to indicate if they are gay. The assistant director of admissions explained that gay students bring "a unique quality" to the college, which he said tries hard not "to be too homogeneous."

The public schools are a major battleground in the gays’ efforts to censor any criticism of their goals or lifestyle. Every year, the National Education Association (NEA) passes resolutions not only demanding that schools not discriminate against sexual orientation, but also insisting that classroom language be monitored to punish "homophobia" and to "promote ‘acceptance’ and/or ‘respect’ instead of ‘tolerance’" of the gay lifestyle.

Taking their demands for censorship into the courts, the gays have been winning. After the Poway High School near San Diego endorsed the gay project called "Day of Silence," the Ninth Circuit upheld the school in forbidding student Tyler Harper to wear a T-shirt with the words "homosexuality is shameful, Romans 1:27."

The dissenting judge pointed out the intolerance of those who claim they want tolerance for minority views. But Judge Stephen Reinhardt, who sided with the school, wrote that Tyler’s defenders "still don’t get the message."

I am getting the message: for Judge Reinhardt, gay rights means intolerance for free speech.

Clinton apologists once defended his scandalous conduct by saying it was "only about sex." It’s increasingly clear that the gay ideology is about far more than sex; it assaults our fundamental right to free speech.

Sexologist’s Death Spotlights Lies Behind ‘Gender Identity’ Theories

By Jim Brown and Jenni Parker
July 21, 2006

(AgapePress) – A pro-family leader says the recent death of prominent psychologist and sexologist Dr. John Money, Ph.D., of Johns Hopkins University highlights the faulty foundations of the so-called "gender identity" movement.

After Dr. Alfred Kinsey, Money — who died earlier this month, one day before his 85th birthday — was perhaps the best known and most influential sexologist ever. He is said to have laid the foundation for the transgender movement by starting the gender identity program at Johns Hopkins.

Bob Knight     

But critics like Bob Knight of the Culture and Family Institute claim both Kinsey and Money relied on faulty research and had a "no limits" view of human sexuality. And both, the pro-family spokesman notes, have left an unfortunate legacy of medical misinformation and misguided psychological theories, all based on falsehoods with tragic consequences for modern society.

Knight says Money is particularly notorious for his role in the case of David Reimer, a baby boy whose parents were convinced, after a seriously bungled circumcision, to turn their son into a daughter. At the sexologist’s urging, the parents agreed to have their son surgically rendered anatomically female.

Later, the child received estrogen injections and was raised as a girl under Money’s supervision at the Psychohormonal Research Unit at Johns Hopkins. This so-called "gender reassignment," which was a tragedy for the child, was touted as a triumph by the doctor, Knight points out. "John Money," he notes, "for 14 years reported in scientific journals that it had been a complete success, proving that biology has nothing to do with your sexual identity."

Only years afterward was the sad truth revealed, the Culture and Family Institute spokesman explains. "All along, this little boy was yearning to be a boy, did not want to wear dresses, rejected his female identity," he says. "And this came out later in Rolling Stone magazine, and then in a book called As Nature Made Him by John Colapinto — how Money falsified the findings in order to prove that gender is just a construct in your head."

Unfortunately, Knight points out, the doctor’s deception proved widely influential. "The feminists quoted John Money’s articles extensively, saying that maleness and femaleness had nothing to do with your biological self — it’s just who you think you are," he says.

"So it paved the way," the pro-family advocate continues, "for a couple generations of confused people [to be led into] believing that they were born in the wrong bodies." Many of these confused people were "encouraged to undergo even surgery," Knight says. "This is a tragedy."

According to some sources, Money’s misrepresentations of his findings and his unreported failure with David Reimer have led more or less directly to the surgical reassignment of thousands of infants as a matter of policy at many medical institutions. The well-known sexologist’s ideas have also influenced many teens and adults to try to address their psychological gender-identity confusion with drastic sexual reassignment surgery.

Two year’s ago, Paul McHugh, chief psychiatrist at Johns Hopkins, expressed distaste for the way many in the psychiatric community have encouraged patients to pursue sexual reassignment. He observed that psychiatrists, instead of counseling people who were questioning their gender identity to visit a surgeon, should have been helping clients restore their actual gender identity.

Gay Behaviors vs. Public Health
By Robert Seidenberg 
Published 6/29/2006 12:07:19 AM

 
 "Are you a male who has had sex, even once, with another male since 1977?"

This is one of the questions that all U.S. blood collection facilities must ask when they administer the pre-donation questionnaire to screen potential donors. Anyone answering yes to this question is "indefinitely deferred," or in plain language, banned for life from donating blood. Despite pressure from gay advocates to change it, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has maintained this policy for 22 years. However, the pressure has intensified lately with gay activists successfully stopping college blood drives with cries of "discrimination."

Thus, this past March, the FDA held yet another workshop to review the male-sex-with-male (MSM) policy, and will convene the Blood Product Advisory Committee (BPAC) in mid-July to render an official decision. Based on recommendations made at the workshop, it is very likely that BPAC will finally recommend a modified policy. If they do, gays will claim a victory over "discrimination," and that is all that will be reported in the sound-bite media.

Although the idea that the FDA has been arbitrarily discriminating against gays is nonsense, no one in the biomedical establishment will attempt to counter this assertion because the very purpose of the change is to allay the "perception of discrimination." Whichever new policy is enacted could still essentially be a lifetime ban.

Once we delve below the headlines, we find that far from discriminating against homosexuals, our biomedical establishment has gone out of its way to mollify them, even to the point of compromising public health. While the medical literature on the dangers of homosexual behavior is massive, and readily available on the web if you search for it, it is omitted from literature directed specifically to the public. That the FDA now finds itself in the awkward position of repealing a successful blood-safety policy in order to ward off hysteria over "discrimination," is largely due to the fact that our public health officials have always failed to state plainly that the gay lifestyle is dangerous.

The Policy Debate
Since the late 1990s, responding to pressure from gay advocates, some experts have proposed that the ban could be safely reduced to a rolling five-year period or even a rolling 12-month period. What this means is that the question would be changed to "Are you a male who has had sex, even once, with another male in the past five years [or 12 months]?" A ‘yes’ answer would result in another five-year [or 12-month] deferral. But this debate only underscores the serious risks of homosexual behavior.

First of all, it reflects a unanimous agreement that at least a rolling 12-month deferral is necessary. Second, even the least stringent form of the ban is essentially a life-time ban: With a rolling 12-month deferral, a man who wished to donate blood on a regular basis would have to refrain from homosexual relations for years at a time. Third, the proposals to narrow the ban are based entirely on improvements in blood-testing technology. Proponents of the five-year and 12-month deferrals argue that the window of time when infection could be present but not detected by a laboratory test has been sufficiently reduced to allow for a lower limit. No one has posited that MSM sex is less risky than previously thought.

Yet, despite the political volatility of the subject, the ban has heretofore been retained in its most stringent form. Why? Because, while every version of the deferral offers some protection against circumstances under which a laboratory test may not detect a known pathogen; the longer the deferral, the better the protection against an unknown pathogen. To appreciate this concern, we have to address the question that is never publicly discussed:

What Do Homosexuals Do That Is So Dangerous?
The over-emphasis on condom use for "safe sex" has created the false impression that all sexual behaviors are equally risky. Yet homosexual men use condoms more than heterosexual couples. Nonetheless, homosexuals are a high risk group for a host of illnesses, while among heterosexuals, only prostitutes are considered at high risk.

The cause of concern is the typical behavior in the gay culture. Characteristic behaviors include extreme promiscuity, anal intercourse, and anal-oral contact. Each of these alone is a high risk behavior. Combined, they expose participants to an immeasurable number of viral and bacterial infections.

The media constantly portray the gay lifestyle as parallel to normal heterosexual life, but the lifestyles are not remotely the same. For example, extreme promiscuity occurs in only a small percentage of the general population. According to the National Health and Social Life survey, the average number of lifetime sex partners in the general population is four (six for men, two for women). By comparison, numerous studies show that gay men typically have hundreds of sex partners. The well-known Bell/Weinberg study found that 74 percent of gay men reported having more than 100 partners, 41 percent more than 500 partners, and 28 percent more than 1,000 partners.

As a result of these activities, men who have sex with men (MSM) constitute a high risk group for syphilis, gonorrhea, Hepatitis A, Hepatitis B, and AIDS. Human Papilloma Virus (HPV), which causes anal warts, is almost universal among MSM, and make MSM the highest risk group for anal cancer, with incidence 39 times greater than the general population. MSM are also almost uniquely at risk for a cluster of painful gastrointestinal ailments known collectively as Gay Bowel Syndrome. And this list of ailments peculiar to the gay lifestyle is far from exhaustive.

This brings us back to the key reason why the 1977-to-life ban has been maintained: the concern about unknown pathogens. Just as HIV/AIDS entered the blood supply in the 1980s because it was impossible to have a laboratory test for an undiscovered virus; so it is continually possible that a new, as yet unidentified pathogen, could enter the blood supply. The etiology of transfusion-acquired AIDS was directly correlated with the number of homosexual men in a blood bank’s donor base. Because the homosexual lifestyle continues to be characterized by the high risk behaviors described above, the question remains how a five-year rolling deferral could protect the blood supply from a currently unidentified pathogen that, like HIV, has a 10-15 year incubation period.

This concern has been validated on several occasions; most recently in July 2005, when a new, drug resistant, strain of HIV was discovered in gay men in New York and California. Hemophiliacs, who comprise the only organized group regularly dependent on blood products, remain vehemently opposed to modifying the MSM policy, specifically because of the concern about unknown pathogens. During the 1980s, as a result of transfusion-acquired HIV, life expectancy for hemophiliacs plummeted from 68 to 49 years. The introduction of the MSM donor deferral policy, two years before an HIV screening test could be developed, resulted in a 90 percent reduction in the risk of acquiring HIV by transfusion. Modifying the current policy compromises the most vulnerable transfusion recipients.

Sending the Wrong Message
Putting the transfusion question aside, the biomedical establishment is compromising a much larger group by failing to speak candidly about the dangers of MSM behavior. This failure is evident in the gross discrepancy between blood banking’s internal literature, used to regulate the manufacture of blood products; and its external or public relations, literature, used to inform the public about risk and safety issues.

We would expect consistency in these two types of literature. If, for example, intravenous drug use is identified as a risk behavior in the regulatory literature, we would expect it to be identified as a risk behavior in the public relations literature as well. And in fact, it is. Yet this is not the case with regard to homosexual behavior. Here, instead, the dual literatures are in glaring contradiction to each other.

For example, in a Red Cross educational teen comic book, we are given the specific messages that intravenous drug use is a risk behavior, and that sex without condoms is a risk behavior, but homosexuality is not regarded as a behavior at all; it is "who you are"; and, as the comic book also makes clear, anyone who thinks otherwise is an ignorant bigot.

In the regulatory literature, on the other hand, MSM is defined as a "high risk behavior" and identity labeling is studiously avoided. Early on in the development of the questionnaire, the FDA discovered that many men who had had some same-sex contact, did not identify themselves as "gay" or "bi." Thus the questionnaire evolved to be strictly behavioral. It does not ask, "Are you gay?" It asks specifically about the behavior, the frequency of behavior ("even one time"), and the time frame in which the behavior occurred ("since 1977"). And, of course, the whole debate over the deferral policy is about time frame, which reflects the underlying knowledge that homosexual behavior, rather than inclination, is what is at issue.

With Hollywood glamorizing gay life, government and religious authorities endorsing it, and our biomedical establishment failing to issue the proper warnings, an increasing number of young men are being drawn to try this behavior. Insanely, the San Francisco Department of Public Health website offers instructions for "safely" engaging in anal intercourse, analingus, even "fisting."

The fact that young men are being sent the wrong message is evident in the continuous stream of Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reports that show sharp increases in AIDS, syphilis, gonorrhea, and other illnesses among MSM, after a brief period of decline during the AIDS panic of the 1980s. Despite two decades and billions spent in "AIDS awareness," risk behavior is again rampant; and not surprisingly, a disproportionate percentage occurs among youth ages 15 to 22.

Our public health officials now find themselves in the odd position of kowtowing to an identity group whose activists believe that in order to fulfill their identity they must engage in the very acts that health officials, and anyone with an ounce of common sense, know to be unhealthy. The only way to stop this madness is for our health institutions — in particular the CDC, the FDA, and American Red Cross — to launch an education program to inform the public of the high risks of homosexual behavior. Given the public mood, it’s not an easy course. But this is the solid reality. To continue to indulge in the popular delusion of the activist homosexual lobby will only further erode the public health.

Robert Seidenberg worked as a technical writer at American Red Cross Blood Services, National Headquarters from 1994 to 2002.